This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art that may be related to various aspects of the present invention that are described and/or claimed below. This discussion is believed to be helpful in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present invention. Accordingly, it should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light, and not as admissions of prior art.
Processor-based devices, such as computer systems, may be linked together via one or more networks, such as Local Area Networks (“LANs”) or Wide Area Networks (“WANs”), for example. These networks are generally arranged with a particular topology that characterizes the geometric arrangement of the specific network. For instance, LANs may be arranged in accordance with a bus topology, a ring topology, a star topology, a tree topology, or a combination of such topologies. Further, networks may also be classified by architecture (e.g., peer-to-peer or client/server) and may be characterized by a protocol that defines a common set of rules and signals that are utilized to communicate on the network.
Generally, each network includes one or more servers or processing systems configured to manage and allocate network resources to other systems coupled to the network. File servers, print servers, network servers, and database servers, for example, are different types of processing systems that are generally dedicated to performing pre-defined tasks on the network. Each of these systems may provide services to client systems based upon departmental or logical groupings, which may be distributed across geographic boundaries. As a result, the processing systems may be geographically dispersed to provide services to client systems in different buildings, cities, states, or countries.
Because the systems may be located in different geographic locations, maintenance and management of the systems may be difficult. For instance, a single group or person may provide maintenance and management for the systems, which may be located remotely from some or all of the systems being managed. The time and expense associated with traveling to each of the systems may be prohibitive and may result in unacceptable levels of support for the systems. Thus, it is beneficial to manage the systems remotely without having to travel to the specific location of the systems.
However, the remote management of the systems may provide only limited access to the managed systems. For instance, a managed system may be monitored by a software-based video redirection technology that provides the interaction between the operating system and other components to a remote management system. When the operating system is not performing properly or not loaded, no information is provided to the remote management system monitoring the managed system. That is, the software-based video redirection technology is unable to provide any valuable information to the remote management system because it does not function when the managed system crashes or enters an “OS (operating system) down” state or when the system is powered off. Further, a managed system may include additional hardware, which may only work in a text mode and not provide data when the managed system enters a graphical mode. This additional hardware may duplicate components already available on the managed system, which adds to the total cost of the system. As such, the remote management solutions are inefficient, limited, and expensive.